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If Republicans are going to try to repeal Obamacare, they should go all the way. Otherwise, don't even start.

BY Adam Brandon Ken Cuccinelli Mike Needham and David McIntosh

03/22/2017

Originally Published in Washington Examiner by Adam Brandon Ken Cuccinelli Mike Needham and David McIntosh on 3/22/17.

Poet and novelist Charles Bukowski once said, "If you're going to try, go all the way. Otherwise, don't even start."

Speaker of the House Paul Ryan, R-Wis., and House Republican leaders could have learned from this pearl of wisdom. Unfortunately, they are trying to ram through the House a bill — the so-called American Health Care Act — that falls far short of their frequent and many campaign promises to repeal Obamacare and create free-market reforms that would lead to greater competition and choice, with lower costs. Those were campaign promises that, by the way, helped Republicans win the House in 2010, the Senate in 2014, and the White House in 2016.

In January 2016, after President Obama vetoed an Obamacare repeal bill that had overwhelming Republican support, Ryan made it clear that the baseline for repeal had been drawn. "We have shown now that there is a clear path to repealing Obamacare without 60 votes in the Senate," he declared. "So, next year, if we're sending this bill to a Republican president, it will get signed into law."

Conservative activists — who have been fighting for years to repeal Obamacare and supporting conservative candidates who got elected on pledges to scrap the 2010 law — will accept nothing less than a bill that follows through on these promises. Just as important are Americans who have seen their premiums skyrocket because of Obamacare. They are looking for relief.

House Republicans now have that opportunity to produce a strong repeal of Obamacare and its onerous regulations, and institute free-market reforms. They shouldn't let themselves be bound by narrow interpretations of Senate rules.

Way back in 2012, the United States Supreme Court, in National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius, issued a landmark ruling that upheld the supposed constitutionality of ObamaCare by justifying the individual mandate as a proper exercise of Congress’s taxing power. This is what allowed ObamaCare to continue to be a drain on our economy and the American taxpayer.

FreedomWorks Vice President of Legislative Affairs made the statements below on the recent developments at the White House concerning health insurance. Concerning Thursday’s executive order about association health plans, Jason Pye said:

The first two laws that comrade Sanders would repeal if given the chance? The law of scarcity and the law of supply and demand. Bernie ignores these basic concepts. Humanity has limited resources leaving us with the problem of distributing those resources among individuals. The government can try - and fail - to distribute those resources for us or the market can distribute do it based on the choices individuals make. Every government that has tried to distribute resources for the people has failed - e.g., the Soviet Union and Venezuela. Every government that has allowed the market to distribute resource based on the choices of individuals has thrived - e.g., Japan, Singapore, South Korea and Hong Kong. A few basic inferences can be made using Bernie's two least favorite laws that would help him better understand the consequences of a single-payer healthcare system.

Last week, four Republican senators unveiled a proposal that could present a path forward on health insurance reform. The proposal, introduced in the form of an amendment to the House-passed version of H.R. 1628, is far from perfect, and it's not the repeal of ObamaCare that was promised. Nevertheless, FreedomWorks is treating it as what is likely to be the last serious attempt at health insurance reform before the September 30 deadline for reconciliation under the FY 2017 budget resolution.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services announced today that it planned to reduce the budget to promote health plans available on the ObamaCare exchanges from the roughly $100 million spent during the last open enrollment period to $10 million for the upcoming open enrollment period, which is set to begin on November 1 and end on December 15. There will also be a reduction in funding for Navigators, from $62.5 million last year to $36.8 million this year.